The White House Office of the Press Secretary For Immediate Release August 05, 2014 Remarks by President Obama at the U.S.-Africa Business Forum Mandarin Oriental Hotel Washington, D.C. 3:20 P.M. EDT PRESIDENT OBAMA: Thank you so much. Thank you. Please be seated. Well, good afternoon, everybody. To Mayor Bloomberg, thank you -- not only for the kind introduction, but to Bloomberg Philanthropies as our co-host, and for the great work that you’re doing across Africa to help create jobs, and promote public health, encourage entrepreneurship, especially women. So thank you very much, Michael, for your leadership. I want to thank our other co- host -- my great friend and tireless Commerce Secretary, Penny Pritzker. (Applause.) I want to welcome all of our partners who are joining us from across Africa -- heads of state and government, and let me welcome the delegations from Sierra Leone, Liberia and Guinea, with whom we are working so urgently to control the Ebola outbreak and whose citizens are in our thoughts and prayers today. I also want to welcome Madame Chairperson Dlamini- Zuma of the African Union Commission; President of the African Development Bank, Donald Kaberuka; as well as the President of the World Bank, Dr. Jim Kim. Please give them all a round of applause. (Applause.) And I want to acknowledge members of Congress who are here and who are such great champions of Africa’s engagement with -- America’s engagement with Africa. In a city that does not always agree on much these days, there is broad bipartisan agreement that a secure, prosperous and self-reliant Africa is in the national interest of the United States. And most of all, I want to thank all of you -- the business leaders, the entrepreneurs both from the United States and from across Africa who are creating jobs and opportunity for our people every day. And I want to acknowledge leaders from across my administration who, like Penny, are your partners, including our U.S. Trade Representative, Mike Froman; USAID Administrator Raj Shah; and our new head of the Millennium Challenge Corporation, Dana Hyde; President of the Export-Import Bank, Fred Hochberg; Director of the U.S. Trade and Development Agency, Lee Zak; and our President and CEO of OPIC, Elizabeth Littlefield. So we are here, of course, as part of the U.S.- Africa Leaders Summit -- the largest gathering any American President has ever hosted with African heads of state and government. And this summit reflects a perspective that has guided my approach to Africa as President. Even as Africa continues to face enormous challenges, even as too many Africans still endure poverty and conflict, hunger and disease, even as we work together to meet those challenges, we cannot lose sight of the new Africa that’s emerging. We all know what makes Africa such an extraordinary opportunity. Some of the fastest- growing economies in the world. A growing middle class. Expanding sectors like manufacturing and retail. One of the fastest- growing telecommunications markets in the world. More governments are reforming, attracting a record level of foreign investment. It is the youngest and fastest-growing continent, with young people that are full of dreams and ambition. Last year in South Africa, in Soweto, I held a town hall with young men and women from across the continent, including some who joined us by video from Uganda. And one young Ugandan woman spoke for many Africans when she said to me, “We are looking to the world for equal business partners and commitments, and not necessarily aid. We want to do [business] at home and be the ones to own our own markets.” That’s a sentiment we hear over and over again. When I was traveling throughout Africa last year, what I heard was the desire of Africans not just for aid, but for trade and development that actually helps nations grow and empowers Africans for the long term. As President, I’ve made it clear that the United States is determined to be a partner in Africa’s success -- a good partner, an equal partner, and a partner for the long term. (Applause.) We don’t look to Africa simply for its natural resources; we recognize Africa for its greatest resource, which is its people and its talents and their potential. (Applause.) We don’t simply want to extract minerals from the ground for our growth; we want to build genuine partnerships that create jobs and opportunity for all our peoples and that unleash the next era of African growth. That’s the kind of partnership America offers. And since I took office, we’ve stepped up our efforts across the board. More investments in Africa; more trade missions, like the one Penny led this year; and more support for U.S. exports. And I’m proud -- I’m proud that American exports to Africa have grown to record levels, supporting jobs in Africa and the United States, including a quarter of a million good American jobs. But here’s the thing: Our entire trade with all of Africa is still only about equal to our trade with Brazil -- one country. Of all the goods we export to the world, only about one percent goes to Sub-Saharan Africa. So we’ve got a lot of work to do. We have to do better -- much better. I want Africans buying more American products. I want Americans buying more African products. I know you do, too. And that’s what you’re doing today. (Applause.) So I’m pleased that in conjunction with this forum, American companies are announcing major new deals in Africa. Blackstone will invest in African energy projects. Coca-Cola will partner with Africa to bring clean water to its communities. GE will help build African infrastructure. Marriott will build more hotels. All told, American companies -- many with our trade assistance -- are announcing new deals in clean energy, aviation, banking, and construction worth more than $14 billion, spurring development across Africa and selling more goods stamped with that proud label, “Made in America.” And I don’t want to just sustain this momentum, I want to up it. I want to up our game. So today I’m announcing a series of steps to take our trade with Africa to the next level. First, we’re going to keep working to renew the African Growth and Opportunity Act -- and enhance it. (Applause.) We still do the vast majority of our trade with just three countries -- South Africa, Nigeria and Angola. It’s still heavily weighted towards the energy sector. We need more Africans, including women and small- and medium-sized businesses, getting their goods to market. And leaders in Congress -- Democrats and Republicans -- have said they want to move forward. So I’m optimistic we can work with Congress to renew and modernize AGOA before it expires, renew it for the long term. We need to get that done. (Applause.) Second, as part of our “Doing Business in Africa” campaign, we’re going to do even more to help American companies compete. We’ll put even more of our teams on the ground, advocating on behalf of your companies. We’re going to send even more trade missions. Today, we’re announcing $7 billion in new financing to promote American exports to Africa. Earlier today, I signed an executive order to create a new President’s advisory council of business leaders to help make sure we’re doing everything we can to help you do business in Africa. (Applause.) And I would be remiss if I did not add that House Republicans can help by reauthorizing the Export-Import Bank. That is the right thing to do. (Applause.) I was trying to explain to somebody that if I’ve got a Ford dealership and the Toyota dealership is providing financing to anybody who walks in the dealership and I’m not, I’m going to lose business. It’s pretty straightforward. We need to get that reauthorized. (Applause.) And you business leaders can help make clear that it is critical to U.S. business. Number three, we want to partner with Africa to build the infrastructure that economies need to flourish. And that starts with electricity, which most Africans still lack. That’s why last year while traveling throughout the continent, I announced a bold initiative, Power Africa, to double access to electricity in Sub-Saharan Africa and help bring electricity to more than 20 million African homes and businesses. Now, we’ve joined with African governments, the African Development Bank, and the private sector -- and I will tell you, the response has exceeded our projections. It has been overwhelming. Already, projects and negotiations are underway that, when completed, will put us nearly 80 percent of the way toward our goal. On top of the significant resources we’ve already committed, I’m announcing that the United States will increase our pledge to $300 million a year for this effort. And as of today -- including an additional $12 billion in new commitments being announced this week by our private sector partners and the World Bank and the government of Sweden -- we’ve now mobilized a total of more than $26 billion to Power Africa just since we announced it -- $26 billion. (Applause.) So today we’re raising the bar. We decided we’re meeting our goal too easily, Zuma, so we’ve got to go up. So we’re tripling our goal, aiming to bring electricity to more than 60 million African homes and businesses that can spark growth for decades to come. (Applause.) Fourth, we’ll do more to help Africans trade with each other, because the markets with the greatest potential are often the countries right next door. And it should not be harder to export your goods to your neighbor than it is to export those goods to Los Angeles or to Amsterdam. (Applause.) So through our Trade Africa initiative, we’ll increase our investments to help our African partners build their own capacity to trade, to strengthen regional markets, make borders more efficient, modernize the customs system. We want to get African goods moving faster within Africa, as well as outside of Africa. And finally, we’re doing more to empower the next generation of African entrepreneurs and business leaders -- it’s young men and women, like our extraordinary Mandela Washington Fellows that I met with last week. And I have to say to the heads of state and government, you would have been extraordinarily proud to meet these young people who exhibit so much talent and so much energy and so much drive. With new Regional Leadership Centers and online courses, we’re going to offer training and networking for tens of thousands of young entrepreneurs across Africa. New grants will help them access the capital they need to grow. Our annual Global Entrepreneurship Summit this year will be held in Morocco. Next year, it will be held for the first time in Sub-Saharan Africa -- because we want to make sure that all that talent is tapped and they have access to the capital and the networks and the markets that they need to succeed. Because if they succeed, then the countries in which they live will succeed. They’ll create jobs. They’ll create growth. They’ll create opportunity. So the bottom line is the United States is making a major and long-term investment in Africa’s progress. And taken together, the new commitments I’ve described today -- across our government and by our many partners -- total some $33 billion. And that will support development across Africa and jobs here in the United States. Up to tens of thousands of American jobs are supported every time we expand trade with Africa. As critical as all these investments are, the key to unlocking the next era of African growth is not going to be here in the United States, it’s going to be in Africa. And so, during this week’s summit, we’ll be discussing a whole range of areas where we’re going to have to work together -- areas that are important in their own right, but which are also essential to Africa’s growth. Capital is one thing. Development programs and projects are one thing. But rule of law, regulatory reform, good governance -- those things matter even more, because people should be able to start a business and ship their goods without having to pay a bribe or hire somebody’s cousin. Agricultural development is critical because it’s the best way to boost incomes for the majority of Africans who are farmers, especially as they deal with the impacts of climate change. Rebuilding a strong health infrastructure, especially for mothers and children, is critical because no country can prosper unless its citizens are healthy and strong, and children are starting off with the advantages they need to grow to their full potential. And we’re going to have to talk about security and peace, because the future belongs to those who build, not those who destroy. And it’s very hard to attract business investment, and it’s very hard to build infrastructure, and it’s very hard to sustain entrepreneurship in the midst of conflict. So I just want to close with one example of what trade can help us build together. Kusum Kavia was born in Kenya; her family was originally from India. Eventually, she emigrated to the United States and along with her husband started a small business in California. It started off as a small engineering firm. Then it started manufacturing small power generators. With the help of the Export-Import Bank -- including seminars and a line of credit and risk insurance -- they started exporting power generators to West Africa. In Benin, they helped build a new electric power plant. And it’s ended up being a win-win for everybody. It’s been a win for their company, Combustion Associates, because exports to Africa have boosted their sales, which means they’ve been able to hire more workers here in the United States. They partner with GE; GE is doing well. Most of their revenues are from exports to Africa. It’s been a win for their suppliers in Texas and Ohio and New York. It’s been a win for Benin and its people, because more electricity for families and businesses, jobs for Africans at the power plant because the company hires locally and trains those workers. And they hope to keep expanding as part of our Power Africa initiative. So this is an example of just one small business. Imagine if we can replicate that success across our countries. Kusum says, “When our customers see the label, ‘Made in America,’ when they see our flag, it puts us above all the competition.” And her vision for their company is the same vision that brings us all here today. She says, “We really want to have a long-term partnership with Africa.” So Kusum is here. I had a chance to meet her backstage. Where is she? Right there. Stand up, Kusum. So she’s doing great work. Thank you so much. (Applause.) But she’s an example of what’s possible -- a long-term partnership with Africa. And that’s what America offers. That’s what we’re building. That’s the difference we can make when Africans and Americans work together. So let’s follow Kusum’s lead. Let’s do even more business together. Let’s tear down barriers that slow us down and get in the way of trade. Let’s build up the infrastructure -- the roads, the bridges, the ports, the electricity -- that connect our countries. Let’s create more and sell more and buy more from each other. I’m confident that we can. And when we do, we won’t just propel the next era of African growth, we’ll create more jobs and opportunity for everybody -- for people here in the United States and for people around the world. So thank you very much, everybody, for what so far has been an outstanding session. APPLAUSE)
Posted on: Wed, 06 Aug 2014 23:55:16 +0000
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